Page:Letters of Life.djvu/202

190 now, our purposes "like kindred drops were melted into one."

It was suggested that residence at a boarding-school in one of the larger cities, and attention to those ornamental branches which the taste of the times demanded, might give a prestige to our desired profession. Forthwith, at the coldest period of one of our coldest winters, without companion or protector, we might have been seen slowly rumbling in the stage-coach over frozen ground, for the greater part of a day, toward the banks of the ice-bound Connecticut. At two of the best seminaries that Hartford then afforded, we devoted ourselves to the accomplishments of drawing, painting in water-colors, embroidery of various kinds, filigree, and other things too tedious to mention. "Cobwebs to catch flies," said my sweet associate with a sigh, as we laid by our working implements late at night, our hearts turning to our distant homes, and the fond parents who missed from their fireside the brightness of the one young face.

At our return, and announcement that we would open a joint school, we were thronged with applicants. Its location was on the beautiful plain between the old town and the southern section of Norwich, where we became fellow-boarders with the widowed sister of my friend.

The first appearance before our assembled disciples was formidable. There they were, in full array, every